How to play

Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar — Tronsoft Games

The short version: behave well, in public and in private, until eight shrines agree that you have. Then go and be examined on it.

Movement

Britannia is drawn on a hex grid, so there are six ways to go rather than four.

Key	Direction	Key	Direction
`Q` or `W`	north-west	`E`	north-east
`A`	west	`D`	east
`Z`	south-west	`X`	south-east

Arrow keys work too. You can also click any hex on the map and the party will walk there a step at a time, stopping the moment anything interrupts — an ambush, a coastline, a mountain wall. Each step costs one unit of food.

Mountains cannot be crossed, and water cannot be swum. For water you need the frigate moored at Britain Harbour: stand on the harbour and type board. land puts you ashore, and land ne puts you ashore on the side you name, which matters on a cramped island.

Turn order

In the open land, one command is one turn. Moving, waiting, camping and searching all advance the clock; talking and buying do not.

In battle the field becomes an 11 by 9 hex grid. Your party acts first, one character at a time in party order, and then every enemy acts. The character waiting for orders is ringed in gold. On a character's turn you may:

move one hex — move ne
attack a numbered enemy within your weapon's reach — attack 2
cast a spell you have the reagents for — cast iceball 1
take a blow meant for a companion — shield Iolo
hold station — pass

A creature reduced below a quarter of its health may turn and run. Let it go and your Compassion rises. Cut it down as it flees and your Compassion falls, and the victory no longer counts as a clean one for Honor.

Raising a virtue

Every virtue is a number from 0 to 99 that you are never shown directly in play. The bars beside the map draw it; Hawkwind, the seer in Castle Britannia, will read any virtue to you in words.

Virtue	How it is most easily raised
Honesty	Overpay a merchant. Never steal.
Compassion	Give to beggars. Spare fleeing creatures.
Valor	Win battles. Never flee one.
Justice	Report thieves to the magistrate at Yew.
Sacrifice	Give blood at a healer. Shield a companion in battle.
Honor	Win cleanly, and keep the promise you swear at Trinsic.
Spirituality	Meditate at a shrine.
Humility	Answer Lord British humbly when he offers you the chance to boast.

Being elevated

Three things must be true at once: you hold that virtue's rune (search the town), you know its mantra (ask a teacher there about the mantra), and the virtue itself stands at 99. Then at its shrine:

meditate om 3

Three cycles, with the right mantra. Do that for all eight.

An elevation is not permanent. If you later do something that drags the virtue below full, the elevation goes with it. You can earn both back; there is no way to make this quest unwinnable.

Winning

Eight elevations are necessary and not sufficient. You also need:

The Bell of Courage — sail to the wreck in the eastern sea and dive.
The Book of Truth — at the Lycaeum. search book.
The Candle of Love — at Cove. search candle.
The Word of Passage — three coloured stones, one at the bottom of each of the three dungeons, each placed on its matching altar. Each altar gives one syllable; the three together spell the word.

At the Abyss: use bell, use book, use candle, then say the word. Descend eight levels. The Codex asks eleven questions about the virtues and the three principles they spring from. Answer all eleven and you are the Avatar, and the quest is over.

Losing

You cannot lose permanently. If the whole party falls, you wake in Castle Britannia with half your gold and half your health, and the frigate is found back at its berth. If you answer the Codex wrongly, you are set down at the mouth of the Abyss and may descend and try again.

Running out of food is survivable too: the party starves slowly rather than dying outright, which gives you time to reach a provisioner. Yew sells food and torches; healers restore the party for a hundred gold; Lord British heals you for nothing if you ask after his health.

Restarting and saving

Save journal keeps one saved game in your browser's local storage; Load journal brings it back, and you will be offered it automatically next time you open the game. New quest starts again with a newly generated Britannia — the towns and shrines stand in the same relation to one another, but the coasts, forests and mountains are different. Starting a new quest does not erase the saved journal.

A first hour

Walk to Castle Britannia and talk lord british. Ask about the quest, the avatar, the codex and the abyss. Answer him humbly — repeatedly, if you like.
Go to Britain. Buy leather and a long sword. Ask the healer about the mantra, then search rune. Give to the beggar until Compassion is full, then recruit Iolo.
Yew next: rune, mantra, report thief until Justice is full, and buy food and torches for the road.
Keep going. Each town holds a rune, a mantra, a companion and a way to practise its virtue.

The full command list and every scoring rule are in the player's manual, docs/manual.pdf.